


Safe Deposit

by slutbumwalla



Series: Safe [3]
Category: Captain America (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: F/M, Fluff, Fluff and Angst, Humor, Language, Light Angst, Long Ass Chapter, Mild Sexual Content, Sassy Bucky Barnes, Sexual Frustration
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-11-23
Updated: 2016-11-23
Packaged: 2018-09-01 17:37:03
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,539
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8632339
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/slutbumwalla/pseuds/slutbumwalla
Summary: Bucky drops back in needing a favor, but Reader gets her wires crossed about just what that favor entails.





	

It was a fairly warm day, and you took the opportunity to go work in your little garden out back. You were new to gardening, so your face was a little grim as you tried to figure out which plants were limp from overwatering and which where limp due to underwatering.

You’re grumbling to yourself, gingerly picking at leaves, when your dog lets out a series of shrill barks that has your heart jumping in your throat. You turn around, intending to give him a piece of your mind, only to see him angrily snarling at the hulking figure of a man you thought you’d never see again.

“Jesus, Bucky!” you shout, falling back on your behind and holding a hand to your heart, feeling it pounding alarmingly fast.

“Sorry.” He murmurs.

You flop backwards onto the grass, rubbing your solar plexus for relief and pushing away your dog, who has run over to lick your face out of concern. “Are you trying to kill me??” you pant.

You hear a low laugh as he approaches you, and your dog turns to bark him away. You sit up and grab him, wriggling and angry, and carry him over to the gated-off dog run to deposit him out of the way. Your dog, historically, has not cared for men in your home.*

You turn to find Bucky standing in the middle of your backyard, still impossibly large, surveying your set-up.

“So did you happen to be in town, or is that classified?” you ask, a note of sarcasm in your voice.

He shrugs, turning towards you, “I wanted to check up on you, make sure you were doin’ ok.”

Last time you’d seen him he had saved you from a mugging and then followed you home, where he’d tenderly bandaged you and make sure you didn’t fall into a coma from a concussion. Then he’d disappeared, leaving you oddly hollow and disappointed. You’d been trying to push the memory out of your mind for months now.

“I’m doing great.” You say, turning back towards your tiny garden and kneeling, not sure what to do. Should you offer him some iced tea? Invite him in for conversation? He’d been the Winter Soldier, he was still a wanted man, such trivialities seemed ridiculous in light of who he was. If you were honest with yourself, you were utterly confused to see him again. Your brain might as well have been scrambled eggs.

“You’ll want to limit your watering on these ones. Those ones aren’t gettin’ enough sun.” Bucky is kneeling next to you, surveying your plants.

“What are you doing here?” you ask bluntly, turning to him.

Your eyes finally meet, and you’re jolted again by the steely blue of his gaze as it meets yours. He’s close enough, now, that you’re reminded of how he smells. It’s not clean, necessarily, but it’s not offensive, either. It’s…extremely male. Earthy and slightly tangy, like copper, no doubt due to the metal arm flexing at his side, hidden under his full-sleeved shirt.

You realize that you’re both staring at the other, lost in your individual thoughts.

He pulls his gaze away from you and clears his throat, frowning at your garden. “I just, uh…I told ya. Just wanted to check, make sure you’re ok. Make sure nobody’s been botherin’ ya.” He says it quietly as his fingers brush through your plants, picking dead leaves and positioning healthy ones so that they receive better sunlight.

“Well,” you say slowly, sitting up and frowning at the sky, “there IS this guy at work…” you feel Bucky tense up next to you and try keep your facial expression serious, “We think he’s been stealing lunches from the office fridge, but none of us have been able to prove it.” With that lean back over your garden, grabbing a little spade to poke around as you try to hide your smirk.

You’re gratified to hear Bucky chuckle. “Sense of humor seems to be intact.”

You smile to yourself and then sit back again, surveying the half-tended mess in front of you.

“I could use a break. You want some iced tea?” you offer, pulling off your gardening gloves and tossing them down.

Bucky’s eyes go wide in surprise as you rise and make your way to the house, but he follows nonetheless. He skirts around you in your small kitchen as you pull glasses and fill them with ice.

“Can I help with anything?” he asks, running a hand through his hair, seemingly flustered.

“No, no, I’ve got it, you just go make yourself comfortable.” You wave him away, towards the living room.

Since this is your Saturday and you’d wanted to relax, you’ve decided to just roll with this visit. You have no idea what Bucky wants and, in fact, you frown a little over how bossy he seemed last time and how timid he seems this time. He was sure to get around to it eventually, so you were just going to treat him like any normal guest until he stopped beating around the bush.

“Do you take sugar?” you call out, and he answers in the negative, so you swing around the corner with two tall glasses of iced tea and stop dead in your tracks.

“Unbelievable.” You say, shaking your head and resuming your approach.

Bucky is sitting in the middle of your couch, your fickle dog sprawled on his back next to him in ecstasy at Bucky’s belly rubs.

“Told ya he was a cute little guy.” Bucky says, clearly pleased with himself.

“He doesn’t like anyone.” You watch in delighted awe. You can’t help but reach across Bucky’s lap to give your silly little guy a vigorous head rub as his eyes roll back and he wriggles into the cushions, clearly in seventh heaven. It’s only after a moment that you realize you’ve draped yourself rather inappropriately across Bucky’s lap.

You shoot up so abruptly that the back of your head clips Bucky’s jaw.

“Ah…” he says, rubbing his chin like he’d just realized it itched. You, meanwhile, were rubbing the back of your head and wincing. Was his jaw made of metal, too?

“Dammit!” you mutter, feeling around for a tender spot.

“You’ve got a mouth on you, doll.” Bucky says, leaning over to inspect your head.

Your dog starts barking again, apparently displeased with the turn of events. You shrug out of Bucky’s grasp and pick your dog up, carrying him to the laundry room and shutting the door so he couldn’t get back in. He had access to the dog run from there so he could get outside if he needed but wouldn’t be able to get into the actual backyard. You shuddered at the thought of him having unsupervised access to the bags of fertilizer you’d stacked in the corner of the lawn, or the palates of perennials you hadn’t gotten around to planting yet.

Gardening was more complicated than you’d thought.

You come around the corner still rubbing your head and flop back down on the couch, grabbing a throw pillow to hug as you curl your legs under you and subliminally adopt a defensive crouch toward Bucky, who is still sprawled, legs wide open, smack in the center of your couch.

“You ok? Not gonna need me to stay the night again, are ya?” He smirks at you, amused.

Your lips twist as you crane your neck, cracking it and remembering waking up to an unsigned note and no offer of further friendship between the two of you. He came, he saved, he disappeared and you spent several weeks with that clenched knot of disappointed anticipation in your stomach.

So no, you’d rather not go through that again.

The only answer you give is a shake of your head as you reach over and grab your glass of iced tea, now sweating onto your coffee table. You take a deep drink and sigh out a breath of relief.

You replace the glass and lean back on the arm of your couch, finally making yourself meet Bucky’s eyes. “So are you satisfied?”

“Huh?” he looks confused.

“You said you came to check, see if I was ok. Are you satisfied?”

“Well you seem to be a little bit clumsy for your own good, I’d really rather you take better care of that noggin…” he smiles but you’re rolling your eyes at being called clumsy. You know very well you’re not, just…maybe around him.

“I actually wanted a favor.” Bucky says, surveying the room, his tone suddenly businesslike.

You raise your eyebrow. “Oh?”

“This place is off the grid for me. Nobody knows I have a connection here.”

Your face twists into a comically confused look at being referred to as a “connection”, but Bucky is up and pacing around the room now, so he doesn’t notice.

“I need to leave something here.” He stops in front of you, hands behind his back, brow furrowed in seriousness.

“Uhhh…” you say, surprised at this turn, “It’s not a ring of power, is it?”

He looks genuinely confused and you move on quickly from the fact that he’s clearly never seen nor read Lord of the Rings.

“Never mind. Dumb joke. Um…what is it you need to leave?”

He stares at you until you get it.

“Are you kidding me?? It’s CLASSIFIED??” you shriek.

He resumes pacing, a rueful look on his face. “I can’t tell you. I just need a safe space to keep it for a little while. Somewhere no one is going to look.”

You’re sitting on the couch, slack-jawed. Never in a million years would you have thought you’d be in this position. Bucky dealt in major-league espionage, what kinds of things would he need to hide? Were you going to come home one day to find your house trashed over a secret file or a…your breath hitches as you think of it…some sort of explosive device? Weapon of mass destruction? Chemical bomb?

You’re frowning down blankly at your couch cushion when Bucky slides in next to you, gently grabbing your chin and pulling your troubled gaze up to his. “I wouldn’t ask if I had anywhere else to go. And this is important. And…” he pauses, searching your face, “I trust you. Do you trust me?”

Your brain is racing and his deep blue gaze isn’t helping your thought process straighten out. Bucky Barnes wanted to keep something dangerous at your house.

There was a long silence as you bit your lip in consideration and his eyes bore into yours before you slowly nodded.

“Ok.” You breathed.

His whole body sagged in relief, and suddenly you were pulled into his giant bear embrace. Flustered, you wrapped your arms around him as he breathed “Thank you” into your hair.

You shuddered a little as his warm breath hit the crook of your neck, sending chills down your spine. He pulled away and cupped his hand around your face, looking straight into your eyes. “You have no idea what this means to me.”

You don’t know what gets into you, but suddenly you lean forward and kiss him. He stiffens and as soon as you realize that he’s shocked you pull back, covering your mouth and reaching out a hand to brace on his chest, keeping space between you.

“I’m sorry, I don’t know what that was…” you uncurl yourself from the couch and take up your tea glass, avoiding eye contact as your face burns and you retreat to the kitchen.

The sun is setting. You dump the watered-down contents of your glass into the sink and rinse it out, making busy work of wiping it clean before refilling it with ice and pouring yourself a fresh glass of tea. You’re taking deep swigs of it, staring out as the sun continues to lower over your backyard, trying to hold in the tears that threaten to spill when you hear Bucky approach.

“Hey,” he says, and there’s so much concern in his voice that, dammit, tears come anyway.

Keeping your back to him, you try to wipe as discreetly as you can, but your voice gives you away. “I’m so sorry, Bucky, that was…” you clear your throat and hold your head up, willing yourself to hold it together. “That was completely inappropriate.” You finish in a stronger voice.

You feel his flesh hand wrap around your shoulder as he gently tries to get you to face him. You tuck your head into your opposite shoulder, not quite ready.

“Look, doll, I’m the one who’s sorry. No one…ahh…no one has tried to be with me like that in a while. I’m not used to it.”

At his insistent gentle pressure, you finally turn. His face is in agony at seeing your eyes swollen with tears. His flesh hand goes up to brush them away.

You’re struggling to keep the waves of emotion inside you under control, recognizing that you’ve now put both of you in a situation that neither of you seem equipped to handle. Your hand moves to gently swat at his wrist so you can wipe the last of the tears yourself. You give a final sniff before bracing yourself and smiling determinedly, looking up into his eyes.

“You know what, I didn’t even consider that. I’m so sorry, I should have asked. Don’t worry about it, it was just a…caught up in the moment thing.” You wipe uselessly at your eyes and smile at him again, “Probably seen too many James Bond films.” You gulp at your iced tea and sweep past him, careful to avoid contact.

This man had been an utter gentleman to you from the start and you embarrass both of you by throwing yourself at him. Now you’re the one pacing in your living room. As you see him emerge from the kitchen and lean against the door frame, you stop pacing and face him, swinging your arms a bit before securing them behind your back, trying not to fidget.

“So do you still want to, uh…” you look around, biting your lip and shrugging. What if the kiss had compromised everything? Now he’d have to find a new space to hide.

“It was nice.” He says, quietly.

“Hmm?” you raise your eyebrows, not sure you heard right.

“It was nice to have you kiss me.”

“Oh.” You say lamely, and then to your horror you’re crying again, silent tears falling down your face.

“Oh, hell…” Bucky grits out, and in a few quick strides he’s crossed over to you and taken you up in his arms. You gasp in surprise before his mouth is over yours. He’s got his metal arm at the small of your back, pressing you to him so tightly you’re on your tiptoes trying to meet his height. His flesh hand is anchored at the back of your neck, holding you in place as his mouth ravishes yours.

You’ve never been kissed like this in your life. Your head spins and you feel your heart beating wildly in your chest. Bucky is gripping you almost painfully tight. He breaks the kiss and you suck in desperately needed oxygen as he pulls your head to one side, exposing your neck to more fervent kisses.

You don’t realize you’re quietly moaning his name until he traces kisses up the side of your neck and nips your earlobe before huskily whispering your name and then licking the shell of your ear. You give a violent shudder as you hear him murmur, “You have no idea what it does to me to hear you moan my name, baby doll.”

You smile and turn your face into his neck, pressing soft kisses along his jawline before you feel him setting you back on your feet with a reluctant sigh.

You look up at him in confusion.

“I’d be lyin’ if I said I didn’t find you sexy as hell,” he says, his full drawl coming out. He bites his bottom lip and flashes you a cheeky smile and a wink before he runs his hand through his hair and lets loose a deep sigh, “I’m damaged goods, doll. I could be selfish and take what I want,” here he runs his hands down your arms, squeezing a little, “but believe me when I say that wouldn’t be fair to you. I can’t even tell you how unfair it would be to you.”

“Why?” you ask, your body still strumming from the kiss and wanting more.

He stares at you a long moment until you suddenly gasp in outrage.

“Godammit, Bucky Barnes, if you tell me it’s classified…!!!”

“Whoa, whoa, whoa…” his arms fly to pin yours at your side and you didn’t even realize you’d started beating at him, although your hands were largely ineffectual against his solid build. “Mouth, doll!” He lifts one hand to trace along your lower lip as his eyes darken, “Mouth…”

You glare at him as his eyes linger where his thumb is brushing back and forth and you swat his hand away, pushing back from him and circling around the coffee table to stand so that it’s in between you. Crossing your arms over your chest, you raise an eyebrow at him. “You need to get your shit together.” Your expression is defiant, challenging him to say anything further about your language.

He runs his hand through his hair again and you wonder if that’s not a nervous tick of his.

“That I do, doll…that I do.” He concedes, sucking in a big breath of air and casting a look back around your house. “If you’ll excuse me, I have a little business to tend to.”

He starts going over your house, top to bottom, and you’re confused for a minute before you remember he wanted to hide something. You flop onto the couch with a dissatisfied grunt and turn on the TV, trying to find something to distract you from whatever he’s got up his sleeve next. You pluck another throw pillow to hug as you scan the channels.

It’s not long before he returns, and you’re still scanning channels, going over and over them without being able to focus on a single program.

“You should see the look on your face, doll. I really get you that hot and bothered?” he smirks, and you feel a wild desire to slap his handsome face.

“Bothered, maybe…” you mutter, mostly to yourself, but you hear him chuckle as he takes the seat next to you.

“Hey, I was there.” He points, and you’ve scrolled to the History Channel. With a huff you flick the TV off and throw the remote down a little more violently than you’d intended.

“Ok, well, I’ve got to feed my dog and go to bed.” You say, jumping up, “Early day tomorrow, lots to do. So if you’re done you can, you know…scat.”

He raises his eyebrow, “Scat?”

You ignore Bucky and go scoop food into your dog’s bowl before letting him back into the main part of the house. He skitters around the corner and dives in and you leave him to it while you retreat to your bedroom to change into your pajamas, not bothering to look at Bucky. Knowing him he’d disappear into the night and somehow all your doors and windows would still be locked from the inside.

You’ve just barely changed and are about to put your hair up when your door bursts open and Bucky strides across the room towards you. He takes you up in a very similar embrace to earlier and kisses you breathless before setting you back on the floor, stunned.

“I’ll be seein’ you, doll. Don’t forget.” He winks and strides right back out of your room, whistling.

That son of a bitch, you think to yourself.

*****

You don’t sleep well, tossing and turning and waking yourself up every time you roll over and smell Bucky on you. When the morning light is streaming in too brightly for you to ignore you drag yourself out of bed and shuffle into the kitchen, rubbing your eyes as you approach your coffee pot and pop in a pod to brew. You stare out the back door for a few minutes before you realize what you’re looking at.

A riot of color. Your entire garden along the back edge of the yard has been planted. Stunned, you slide open the door and ignore the cold as you pad across the wet grass to take a closer look.

It’s perfect. You’re shivering in the morning cold, but you can’t wipe the giant smile from your face. How the hell had Bucky pulled this off?

You hear your coffee pot sound and you skip back into the house, silly smile still plastered to your face. As you pull down a cup you notice another note.

“Thanks, doll. Take care of yourself.” Not signed, once again.

You raise your lips to your cup and take a sip, leaning one hip on your kitchen counter as you survey your new garden, shaking your head with a small smile on your face.

“I’ll be damned.”

**Author's Note:**

> *Reader has been trying to go on with her life, which has included some dates. Bucky may have followed her on a few occasions, telling himself it was out of concern for her safety. Any man who made it into her home would quickly end up leaving because her dog wouldn’t stop barking. Bucky may be fond of her dog for this very reason.
> 
> Updated: This is written! It's a silly little chapter, up as Part 4 of Safe.


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